Coming this June to a theatre near you: National Agenda Episode II…

The government will present the executive programme for the National Agenda in June, Minister of Public Sector Reform Salem Khazaaleh confirmed on Wednesday. Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Khazaaleh said priority would be given to projects designed to alleviate poverty and reduce unemployment.

He also said special attention would be given to measures to attract investment, upgrade infrastructure, communications, IT and financial services and reinforce judicial independence.

It’s been about 6 months since the agenda was completed and submitted to HM the King and little has been said about it. It seems the first stage will revolve around the most demanding issues in the country: poverty, unemployment, and health. The problem however is that the agenda, like many other “projects” the government undertakes, has no set timetable. It runs less like an agenda, which is supposed to say “this is what we’re going to do and when we’re going to do it” and more like a declarative document that says “this is what we’d like to do when we get around to it”.

While poverty, unemployment and health are always at the cornerstone of every ‘good’ government’s agenda, I’m more interested in the actual reforming elements of the project: specifically media and political reform. I’m hoping they won’t be stage 15 of the national agenda.